The big story of the last quarter is that Reliance Jio has been gradually tightening its grip on the Indian telecom industry. While the big 3 competitors to Jio viz. Bharti, Vodafone, and Idea have managed to maintain their market share, the market share lost by smaller players has been entirely captured by Reliance Jio as seen in the chart.
How did this shift happen?
Reliance Jio has not only built its hold on data by creating a complete ecosystem around its offering but has also managed to get its act together on voice. Remember, Jio is already making operating profits and that will be another boost for its market share. As smartphones expand and also become cheaper, this share of Jio could expand still further. In fact, in Q3, Jio has overtaken Idea in terms of market share!
The winner takes it all…
Reliance Jio is largely betting on the fact that the Indian telecom market could become an essentially duopolistic market. Of course, the merger of Idea and Vodafone will create another formidable player but they will still lag Jio in terms of ARPUs. But what is commendable is that Jio has achieved in 16 months what others have taken close to 15-20 years to achieve. As the shift to data and a unified ecosystem becomes a reality, we could see the shift towards the Jio ecosystem become more pronounced. What Jio has created in Indian telecom is not just a lower price point but a new data experience altogether. Globally, data is replacing voice as the primary mode of interplay and that trend is coming to India too. For Jio the sweet spot in telecom may be just about around the corner.
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